Facebook and politics’ relationship status: It’s complicated

The world’s largest social network is now facing questions about why it took down the pages of two big libertarian groups last week.

By now the company’s answer may sound familiar: It was a mistake.

The Facebook pages of Being Libertarian (125,000+ likes) and Occupy Democrats Logic (132,000+ likes) were removed last week and restored Monday. The company told BuzzFeed that the pages were removed in error.

“Both have been reinstated with any posts that violated our community standards removed,” a Facebook spokesperson said, without specifying which posts were in violation. BuzzFeed reports that a meme on “progressive liberal logic” was removed.

The latest controversial takedowns come as Facebook is facing questions about the deactivation of the account of Korryn Gaines, who was recently killed by police after a standoff.

Advocacy groups sent a letter to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg this week, asking why Facebook deactivated Gaines’ account at the request of Baltimore County police. As I wrote earlier this month, the account of Gaines — who was posting Instagram videos that were being pulled into Facebook during her standoff with police — was taken down temporarily. The account is now in memorialized status.

The letter to Zuckerberg, which was signed by SumofUs, Color of Change, Center for Media Justice and more than a couple of dozen other advocacy groups, also mentions another incident in which Facebook took down a live video broadcast by the girlfriend of Philando Castile, who was shot dead by police in Minnesota. I wrote in July that Facebook said that video was temporarily removed because of a technical glitch.

“In light of these recent events, now is a crucial moment to demonstrate that Facebook as an institution does not silence individuals at the request of the police,” the letter states.

It’s been quite a year for politics and Facebook, which says it has nearly 1.6 billion monthly active users. In May, the company defended itself — and Zuckerberg met with conservatives — after a media report, citing a former Facebook contractor, said the social network was suppressing news from conservative outlets from its Trending News section.

In a post after that May meeting, Zuckerberg said “it doesn’t make sense for our mission or our business to suppress political content or prevent anyone from seeing what matters most to them.”

“It doesn’t make sense for our blah blah blah….” – oh, sure, you back a candidate for president who deletes govt. documents, you back a movement whose leaders call for violence, then you say your business needs conservatives too. You might need their money, but you sure don’t accept their beliefs. Total hypocrite.